GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Ramesh Ponnuru nails some Republicans for their hypocritical arguments about federal spending. He points out that a Romney press release last week quoted Bill Bolling, the Republican lieutenant governor of Virginia, attacking President Obama for cutting defense too much:
“We are very concerned about the impact that sequestration could have on Virginia’s economy,” Bolling said in the statement. He added, “It could also deliver a devastating blow to the private-sector defense contractors who make up a big part of Virginia’s economy, especially in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. This is just another example of how the president’s approach to running the country is jeopardizing our economic viability.”
The same day, the state’s attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, made the same point in his own statement for the Romney campaign. And the campaign hosted a conference call where Representative Randy Forbes, a Virginia Republican, said, “If you look at it from an economic point of view, this is something that is going to have an enormous, devastating blow on Virginia, especially in northern Virginia and in the Hampton Roads area.” There would be “a huge impact on beauty salons, restaurants, car dealers, the entire economy.”
It's true, Virginia's economy might get hurt. Since, you know, it is the top recipient of federal defense dollars. This whole area is just a big federal gravy train. Most of the people we know work for the federal government or for contractors. The economy is artificially propped up thanks to the rest of the country's tax dollars. And it's going so well, in fact, that we can't afford to buy a house without increasing our daily commutes by hours.
Ramesh points out that all sorts of Republicans, including House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon, Senator John McCain and Senator John Cornyn, have made these types of economic arguments in favor of defense spending. But other recipients of federal funds are just as likely to spend money on beauty salons, restaurants, and car dealers as defense contractors, no?
Could a federal budget ever be cut if the impact on beauty salons, restaurants and car dealers is the metric we go by? Ponnuru writes:
Reductions in federal spending, whether for defense or social programs, will, of course, be disruptive to the people, businesses and communities who have come to rely on it. The cuts should not, however, hurt the broader economy. When federal spending falls and jobs tied to that spending disappear, private-sector spending should normally increase and create jobs tied to it.
He ends his piece by reminding Republicans to stick to defensible arguments:
The Republicans resisting big defense cuts generally think that they would jeopardize our national security. That’s a debatable proposition. So debate it. What Republicans should not do is make an economic argument for defense spending that is both untrue and inconsistent with everything else they say about spending and the economy.
When they do that, they treat the nation’s defense as little more than a source of political pork.
Amen! And I'd add that their decision to go for economic arguments in support of bloated Defense budgets undercuts any other arguments that they may want to put forth.
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Comments:
Feb '12
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
I've admired Ramesh Ponnuru before for his intellectual integrity, and I am happy to have occasion to admire him again for it. Although I do not always agree with him, he does not change his views because a Republican is his opponent rather than a Democrat.
May '10
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
But there is a difference in the way conservatives and liberals spend money. Liberals purchase administration. They create agencies that are designed to oversee everyone on their plantation.
Conservatives purchase goods that the private sector builds. How many public roads has the federal government built in America? None. The nation's federal construction company is the Army Corps of Engineers. They didn't build the nation's highways. Private companies did.
The US government doesn't build tanks, aircraft or ships, either. Private companies do.
Edited on July 17, 2012 at 6:00amJul '10
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Point 1: Yes, the Defense budget is bloated and wasteful in many particulars, accountability sucks, and all the rest. I could tell stories from now til Doom's Day. Also in that stack are staggering technologies and capabilities that have never before existed in the Known Universe. And there's the fact that the only consistent and robust defense of the West since 1945 has been rallied to our banner and cheered, if also dismayed, by our long string of miracles. (I know, some of these miracle workers have worked with me and against me.)
You cannot produce such results in a fallen world without some waste, and corruption, and faith that at the other end the result will be enough.
EJ's point is interesting, if not entirely on point. Liberals don't only purchase administration, but they buy more of it and they love it and give it preposterous, unaccountable, irresponsible power, and leave it as a permanent, voracious feature consuming all in its path. Feckless nanny state bozos that they are.
And tanks and planes protect our wealth, but we need people producing that wealth as well. Preferably without that ration-card mentality the state so loves.
Mar '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Section 8.
To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offenses against the Law of Nations;
To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;
To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
To provide and maintain a Navy;
To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
Defense is a Constitutional imperative. It is a different animal, subject to different criteria.
May '10
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
It's statements like these that irreparably discredit Romney's reputation as an anti-Keynesian. The defense racket is as bad as any other and Romney should be ashamed for being an exponent of it. Moreover, the constitutionality of defense spending says absolutely nothing about the quantity of preferable expenditures or on which projects those expenditures should be spent. Romney should be skewered for such stupidity.
Edited on July 17, 2012 at 11:31amMay '12
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
When discussing federal spending Neither party Ever proposes reducing it. There may be individual program examples, but on the whole it Never happens.
If we spend $100B (of which at least $40B is borrowed) on a program and that program is scheduled to increase to $125B the next fiscal year, that is the DC status quo. If a mean old conservative comes along and proposes the next fiscal year to only spend $120B on the program then he/she proclaims they have 'cut' spending by almost 5% and the progressives claim they are going to throw women and children to the lions and old people off a cliff. None of which is true, but the MSM loves it.
Even the 'radical' Ryan Path to Prosperity increases spending 35% in a decade and almost doubles tax revenue in the same period.
There is no intellectual honesty from either party about spending 'cuts'. Individual defense programs do get cut or reduced. F22 is a good example of one that shouldn't be cut, and F35 is an example of one that should. At least the Navy is trying to save money by not putting urinals on aircraft carriers.
May '12
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
He is also one of the few columnists I read that if you Email him a question or comment about one of his columns, he Emails back promptly and engages his readers
Jan '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
It takes courage for conservatives to suggest that defense spending should be cut, too. It shouldn't take courage, though, since it's consistent with wishing to scale back the amount government spends.
Jun '12
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Defense is likely the most important function of the Federal Government assigned by the constitution, many other Federal programs are on weak constitutional grounds, at best. Defense spending is fundamentaly different from other Federal programs.
To the extent defense spending is valid for the defense of the nation, it is justified. It is difficult to decide how much is enough, and an ongoing debate on this is always called for.
The use of economic arguments to support defense spending is a violation of conservative principle.
Government spending of "other peoples money", should only occur, when it is justified by a national need, authorized by the constitution, and is the most economic means to satisfy the identified need.
We do not agree on what is a "need", nor on which"needs" are authorized by the constitution. Most spending today is derived from over a century of progressive efforts to centralize control over all our lives and reduce our individual freedoms.
Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats ever actually reduce overall Federal spending, at most reducing the rate of growth of a few selected programs. For the long term economic health of the country this needs to change.
Sep '10
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Roy Lofquist:
Defense is a Constitutional imperative. It is a different animal, subject to different criteria. · 2 hours ago
If you think calling a wasteful, ill-conceived, monstrosity the Department of Defense makes it a Constitutional imperative then all that needs to be done is change the names of the other agencies to Defense 2, 3 etc. I would estimate approximately 1/3 of the "Defense budget" is spent on defense the rest is just a sugar pot for Politicians to dole out to their constituents and supporters.
I assumed that most thinking people have come to the conclusion that the GOP only likes to talk about small government. One only need to look at their record of the last 50 years to see they are actually in favor of the exact opposite.
May '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Keynes suggested putting people to work by hiring them to dig holes and then fill them up again. In the same spirit, Paul Krugman observed that an alien invasion that destroyed most of the world's infrastructure would be good for the economy because it would put people to work rebuilding it. Obama wants to build high speed rail lines that nobody will use, and green energy industries that won't work. Lefty economics is always some version of digging h0les and filling them up again.
The conservative argument is not that hole digging doesn't "create jobs." Obviously, it does -- in a sense. The hole diggers have useless, makework jobs. This distinguishes them from people doing productive work and creating value. The defense of this country has value. It could be more efficient, sure. But it is in an entirely different category than digging holes.
Oct '10
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Roy Lofquist: Section 8....
Defense is a Constitutional imperative. It is a different animal, subject to different criteria. · 4 hours ago
Employing hairdressers in Virginia is not a Constitutional imperative. Making an argument for retaining defense expenditure on the basis of Virginian hairdresser employment is wrong. When GOPers make this argument they are not just being wrong, they are being dangerous, since they undermine the anti-Keynesian case. So GOPers should not make such arguments.
QED, no?
Mar '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Republicans that think deficit spending on Littoral Combat Ships and F-35's are good are no better than Democrats that think deficit spending on social program is good.
Mar '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Michael Labeit: It's statements like these that irreparably discredit Romney's reputation as an anti-Keynesian. The defense racket is as bad as any other and Romney should be ashamed for being an exponent of it. Moreover, the constitutionality of defense spending says absolutely nothing about the quantity of preferable expenditures or on which projects those expenditures should be spent. Romney should be skewered for such stupidity. · 6 hours ago
Edited 6 hours ago
We seem to rarely agree, but we're pretty much aligned on this. I couldn't have put it better. Yes, we have an obligation to defend our country. But nowhere in the Constitution does it say we must do so with deficit spending or to spend insane amounts of money on weapons that don't work as advertised.
Mar '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Liberal Jim,
I don't dispute your characterization of the DOD. However, misappropriations in non-defense spending result in some overall economic impact, inadequate defense gets people killed.
genferi,
You are correct. Unfortunately there is a very vocal, influential lobby that is intent upon gutting defense. I consider any tactic used to combat their efforts the be not only legitimate but a duty.
Roy
Apr '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
But they once did, and it might be a good idea to have two Navy Yards (east coast & west coast), and a Tank Arsenal in Michigan, and an Aircraft Factory in Kansas.
Apr '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
We are going to have to do both things (reduce spending and raise revenue). There is just no alternative. We have been trapped by our own spendthrift ways.
And, I don't particularly care if revenues double, as long as the economy doubles (although I would like to see the federal government reduced to 8% of the economy. That's probably a 15 or 20 year goal - it's not something we can do in the budget next year. If we have one).
Apr '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Michael Labeit: It's statements like these that irreparably discredit Romney's reputation as an anti-Keynesian. The defense racket is as bad as any other and Romney should be ashamed for being an exponent of it. Moreover, the constitutionality of defense spending says absolutely nothing about the quantity of preferable expenditures or on which projects those expenditures should be spent. Romney should be skewered for such stupidity. · Jul 17 at 2:29am
Edited on Jul 17 at 2:31am
It's not Romney. It's surrogates who have other jobs. Some things it's worth training people not to say, some things are just not worth the effort.
I agree with Ramesh that the line of reasoning is regrettable, although I think that the rejection of Keynes can sometimes go a little overboard; I don't think that defense spending for jobs is a good idea, but they're a genuine side-effect, much like I think deficit spending on increased food stamps is a terrible idea, but that it does increase revenue for all kinds of businesses in the short term.
Mar '11
Re: GOP: Federal Spending Doesn't Create Jobs (Except When It Goes To Defense Contractors)
Glenn the Iconoclast
But they once did, and it might be a good idea to have two Navy Yards (east coast & west coast), and a Tank Arsenal in Michigan, and an Aircraft Factory in Kansas. · 12 hours ago
Since military procurement really isn't a free market, and never has been, I'm all for returning to the Navy Yards/Naval Aircraft Factory model of doing things. Several studies were done in the past showing that when the Navy built some of it's own ships in its own yards, it kept prices down, even when private shipyards were building the same class. That doesn't make sense in a free market situation, but I repeat, military procurement... because of several factors... isn't a free market. We have the appearance of a market, not a true market.